


Through the Heat, Across the Light

by justalittlegreen



Series: Sunshine and Filth [41]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Angst, Camping, Multi, Poly, S&F, poly negotiations, postcanon, punnicutt, sunshine and filth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-28
Updated: 2019-04-28
Packaged: 2020-02-09 10:37:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18636445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justalittlegreen/pseuds/justalittlegreen
Summary: Negotiating a three-person marriage is hard enough. It's harder when you have to lie.Takes place about a year after Benjamin's birth. In the Sunshine & Filth verse.





	1. Chapter 1

BJ dragged his face out of his hand and looked across the campfire. "I knew it," he said bitterly. "You never did need us. Not like we needed you."

Peg hugged her knees, looking pained. "That's not what I said."

"It sounds like it," Hawkeye snapped.

"That's why we're _here_ ," Peg said. "That was the whole point of leaving town, leaving the kids, and just...being the three of us for a minute. We never were. Things always got pushed aside for more important things."

"Peg, are you leaving or not?" BJ's voice struggled against tears. "Because it certainly sounds like you want out."

"No!" Peg cried. "I don't want me out. I want you both _in_."

"We _are_  in," Hawkeye protested. "We're as in as you let us be."

Peg dropped her head into her hands. The fire crackled against the sounds of the night. "Not like you are with each other," she finally whispered. "You'll always have Korea."

"It's not about Korea," Hawkeye replied. "Korea was hell. The last few years have been...anything but. You _know_ that Peg, you have to know that."

"I know that Korea was where you needed each other most, and that I wasn't there," she pointed out. "You forged something. Without me."

"And what do you think we've been doing since '54 if not forging something even stronger, all of us?" BJ cried. "You've - you've never been left out, Peg, but when you roll over, or refuse to tell us what you're thinking - "

"See?" she interrupted. "Us. You two are a unit. You even think that way. I'm the separate one."

Hawkeye snorted. "I don't even know how to answer that, except to laugh at it. You and BJ are the most...impenetrable couple I've ever met. I'm like a flat tire on a tricycle around you two."

This is nonsense," BJ spluttered. "Neither of you is the odd one out. Haven't I been saying this for years? I can't choose between you two any more than I can choose between the kids. It just doesn't work like that."

"Easy for you to say," Hawkeye shot back. "You have two people who'd die for you - "

"Peg would die for you!" BJ interjected.

"You don't know that!"

"Yes I do! You would, Peg, wouldn't you?"

Peg chuckled. "Well that got dark quickly, didn't it."

"See?" Hawk insisted. "That's not an answer. It's not the same, Beej, it's not."

"Whoa. I wasn't finished, _Doctor Pierce._ "

"Well, by all means, _Mrs. Hunnicutt."_

"I don't think we have to measure love by willingness to throw ourselves in front of trains for each other, but let's not forget the fathers of the aforementioned children," Peg said grimly. "You're not disposable, Hawkeye, and you know it. Stop making it about you."

"I'm not!" Hawkeye slapped the log he was sitting on in frustration. "I need a drink."

"Me, too," said BJ, hauling himself up. "Where'd we put the flask?"

"Typical," Peg muttered. "The going gets tough and the tough get drunk."

BJ glared at her. "Nice, Peg. Really nice."

Peg looked back up at him grimly. "I want one, too. We're sharing the damn flask."

 

BJ fished the flask out of the trunk of the car and took a swig as he came back to the fire. Hawkeye was poking at the logs, building the fire back up so they could see better. Peg was breaking small branches over her knee for tomorrow's kindling. BJ stopped at her first, handed her the flask. She took a long swallow, barely making a face.

"That was impressive, for someone who hates scotch that much," BJ kidded lightly. Peg offered him a grin and passed the flask to Hawkeye. He studied it for a minute and put the cap back on before setting it next to the log. 

"Peg, how long have you been feeling this way?" he asked gently. 

She sighed. "Since before you came home, I guess. There have always been moments when things felt right, felt easy. Moments when the marriage felt strong. Moments when it didn't. But lately, it's - " 

" - does this have anything to do with the neighbors?" BJ interrupted suddenly. "Because we'll be gone soon, Peg. They'll be nothing but a bad memory once we settle in Stinson Beach, you know that." 

"There will _always_ be neighbors," Peg said darkly. "We will _always_ have to lie. Don't kid yourself, my sunny optimist." 

"She's right, Beej." 

"I know that. Of _course_ I know that. But it made things harder, didn't it? Am I so wrong?" 

"Of course it did," she said tightly. "It was humiliating. Do we have to relive it?" 

The shock on both their faces stunned her. "What?" she asked irritably. "What's with the looks?" 

"Humiliating?" BJ finally said. "No, that's not how I felt at all." 

"Me neither," Hawkeye chimed in. "Worried? Nervous? Frustrated? Angry? Sure. But humiliated? No, Peg, never." 

She looked back and forth between them, BJ nodding his confirmation that he felt the same way. 

"Oh," she said in a small voice. 

"Peg that was _months_ ago," BJ said. "You've been feeling humiliated over that this whole time?" 

"I didn't think we had to talk about it. I thought we all agreed." 

"And that's what has us here right now," Hawkeye pointed out. 

"Maybe it's because you don't do the shopping," Peggy said thoughtfully, tossing bits of bark and twigs from the tops of her shoes into the fire. 

"I don't follow," Hawkeye says. 

"The market is...it's more than just talk. It's stares. It's the looking in your cart to see if you're buying food for three or four or five. It's the way they stop talking when I approach the butcher counter." Peggy hadn't articulated any of this before, the words coming slowly as she figured it out. 

BJ whistled. "Sounds brutal. But you can't know it's about you." 

"It doesn't have to be," Peggy said quietly. "It's enough to hear it in my head. What if Betsy Gillingham didn't buy the story? What if they think - what if the neighbors think - " 

"Think what?" BJ prompted. 

"A million things. That you're a fool and a cuckhold. That not all the kids are yours. That /I'm/ the fool and my husband is a deviant, perverted - " 

"Well, most of those things are true," Hawkeye pointed out with a smirk. Peg threw a twig at him. 

"Honestly," he continued, "I hadn't thought about it in weeks, Pegs. I had no idea you were - " he gestured vaguely " - still feeling it." 

"It's not just a _feeling,_ " Peg said angrily. "It's not just in my head." 

"Can you be sure?" BJ asked. 

"Stop it! I know what I'm seeing. I'm not making it up and I'm not crazy!" Peg cried. 

Hawkeye passed her the flask again. "Can we continue this in the morning?" he asked, yawning. "My mind's going in circles." 

"Mine, too," BJ said. "Listen, we believe you. Right, Hawk?" 

"Don't look at me; I wasn't the one doubting her to begin with." 

" _Hawkeye._ " 

Peg got up from the fire. "I'm going to bed." 

"Do we get to come with you?" 

She looked at the two of them in the dying light; confused, unhappy, lost. "Yeah," she said. "Come to bed."


	2. Chapter 2

The ground felt harder than it had the last time they went camping - all their bodies were getting more tender. Out of habit, she turned to kiss each of them goodnight. Hawkeye was almost shy with her; BJ held her lips a beat longer than usual. They settled down, Hawkeye's arm thrown over both of them. 

"Peg?" he whispered. "There's no shame in - " he cut himself off with a yawn and fell asleep before he could finish.

Peg listened to the crackling of the fire and the assorted hoops and chirps of the mountain night, waiting to see what daylight would bring.

 

In the morning, they were all gentle with each other. BJ got up first, building the fire back up, breaking out the breakfast supplies. By the time Peg stirred awake at 7, the sun was halfway high, the smell of slightly burnt coffee making its way to her. 

Something clattered and BJ swore, bolting Hawkeye out of a deep sleep. "Beej?" he called, scrambling for the tent flaps. 

"I'm fine!" BJ called back. "Hope you all wanted a little ash with your bacon because that's what's on offer."

Peg groaned and crawled out into the morning, stretching her aching legs. "You should've waited," she scolded. "You know the skillet never falls when he builds the fire."

BJ looked sheepish. "I just wanted to do something nice."

"You did," Peg reassured him, coming around to slide her hands over his shoulders and down his front, kissing his cheek. "Where's the coffee?"

He fetched them both a cup, the speckled blue enamel mugs hot in their hands. Hawkeye dug the box of sugar he'd brought out of the car and dumped in a good handful before sitting with his cup. 

Peg leaned against BJ's arm, resting her head on his shoulder. Hawkeye took a set on the stump next to them, looking like the secret to being awake might be at the bottom of his mug.

"We're going to be okay, aren't we," Hawkeye finally said. It was not a question.

"Only if Peg doesn't leave us," BJ said, half-joking.

Peg sat up. "Don't, BJ," she said. "I need to know if you understand what I was trying to tell you last night."

"You mean that women are more vicious with one glance at a shopping cart than men are with guns, knives, and hand grenades?" BJ asked. "I think I understood that, yes."

Peg tapped a nail against the side of her coffee cup. "You're doctors. Surgeons. War vets. I don't need to tell you how many people in the neighborhood think you're heroes for that. It makes you invincible. They'd never dare criticize you to your faces."

"Right," Hawkeye mused, leaning toward the fire and poking the logs into a semblance of order. "Unfortunately for you, your face is far too pretty to be invincible."

Peg rolled her eyes. "I think our story needs to be better when we move," she said. "It's hard to buy Hawkeye as the fatigued war veteran who needs coddling when he's the life of every single party."

"I never much liked that story anyway," Hawkeye pointed out. 

"And the older the boy gets, the more questions everyone will have," BJ admitted with some resignation. "We could say Hawkeye's a widower with a child. Maybe your brother?"

Peggy and Hawkeye looked at each other before Hawkeye burst out laughing. "They'd have fun figuring out the genetics of that one," he guffawed. "They'd start talking about whether I was the son of the milkman instead."

Peg leaned over and tugged on the back of Hawkeye's shirt, puckering her lips as he turned around. "I don't know how I feel about kissing my sister," he said, holding his hands up in mock defense. 

"And _that's_ why that would never work," Peg said triumphantly.

"We could always just say that Hawk and I are the couple and you're the well-paid housekeeper," BJ offered. "Or the nanny." 

"Which one of you is the wife?" Peg asked drily. 

"He is," they answered in unison, pointing. 

"No fair," Hawkeye groused. "I'm always the wife." Peg giggled despite herself.

"There is one thing we haven't considered yet," Hawkeye said quietly. 

"What?"

"Nah, nevermind. I don't want to say it."

" _Hawk_ "

"You're the brother," Peg said suddenly. Hawkeye's face filled with something like shame as he nodded. She turned to BJ. "You're blonde. Blue eyed. It's less of a stretch to say Hawk and I are the couple and you're the widower brother with the sweet girl who came to live with us after the crushing loss."

"See, it's stupid," Hawk said. "Forget I even - "

"No," BJ interrupted flatly. "It _would_ work better. We could say I introduced you to Hawkeye after we served together in Korea." His face was utterly inscrutable. "We could say that. We'd have to figure something out when your mother comes to visit, or Daniel, but it wouldn't be impossible."

Peggy reached for his hand as he took a long breath and sighed. "It'd make the most sense," she admitted. 

"What about all the people at our wedding?" he asked. Peggy shrugged. "There's a wedding announcement in the Sausalito paper from seven years ago," he continued. "Someone could find out."

"Someone would have to work awfully hard to find out," she replied. "And they'd have to do a lot less work to discover a lot more. But no one's going to be driving by the house and see anything through the windows once we move. And with the guest cottage, the ruse will be very easy to keep up. Isn't that why we built it?"

"I'm _not_ sleeping in the guest cottage!" BJ roared, jerking away from Peg and getting up to pace. "You think it's that easy, to just write our marriage out of existence?"

Peg got up and put her hands on her hips. "You were perfectly fine asking Hawkeye to sacrifice everything so we could still _have_ a marriage that was visible to the world," she shot back.

"Stop!" Hawkeye cried. "Nobody's getting written out of anything. This was always just a story. Beej - " he looked up pleadingly. "Beej, come here."

BJ jammed his hands in his pockets and closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. Neither Peg nor Hawkeye were surprised when his shoulders began to shake and he brought a hand to cover his eyes.

"Darling," Peg began, walking over to him. Hawkeye seemed frozen in his spot. Peggy nudged BJ to sit on the log so she could pull him close to her, his head resting on her belly as he had so many times during her pregnancies. "Hawkeye, come here," she said, knowing her voice would pull him out of whatever had him stuck.

"I'm sorry," BJ whispered. "I'm sorry - I just don't know what - I can't - " He shook his head against her shirt.

"We should've known better than to make the most jealous among us the widower," Hawkeye said as he sat next to BJ and wrapped an arm around his shoulders. "No offense, Beej, but you don't have the stomach for it." He looked up at Peg. She nodded in understanding. BJ might be the great link, the sun around which they both revolved, but he could burn through security faster than either she or Hawkeye could. She stroked his hair. 

"I could never _write out_ our marriage," she said. 

"I wish we lived in some other place. Some other time," BJ muttered. "Somewhere people don't give a damn about what's not theirs to give a damn about."

Hawkeye gave a sad smile, leaned over, and kissed the side of BJ's head. BJ broke into a fresh sob into Peg's shirt, clinging tightly. Peg closed her eyes and let her own tears come. Of course he was right. None of this was fair. Or right.

She bent to kiss the top of BJ's head and then pulled away, looking for Hawkeye's fire-poking stick. Once she had it, she sat next to BJ on the log, gripping the stick like an awkwardly long pencil. She scratched in the dirt at his feet for a moment and nudged him to look up. BJ rubbed his eyes on the shoulder of his shirt and looked down. Hawkeye was already staring, nodding. 

"This is the only way," Peg said. "I don't know how, but I know it's the only way."

She'd drawn their sign - the three interlocked circles, each overlapping the other two. BJ reached for her hand and clasped it, weaving his long fingers between hers. "Right," he whispered. "Even if we have to move to Ottumwa."


End file.
